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<title>Bleak and Tasteful – Ohno's lament by Jaricchi (Temper_Tantrum)</title>
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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23804326">Bleak and Tasteful – Ohno's lament</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Temper_Tantrum/pseuds/Jaricchi'>Jaricchi (Temper_Tantrum)</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Mecha Arashi [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Arashi (Band)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, Mecha</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-03 00:33:41</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,613</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23804326</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Temper_Tantrum/pseuds/Jaricchi</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Satoshi's paintings were dark and without light. Often, greyscale or monotone, without colour or brightness. Bleak but tasteful. Jun would say, with a frown. Satoshi would agree with him.</p><p>His life was without color since he woke up from the healing coma they put him in. His world has become greyscale and monotone, without life. Bleak, but somehow tasteful.</p><p>Yet, mostly –Bland.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>None. (or how you see it)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Mecha Arashi [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1714993</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Bleak and Tasteful – Ohno's lament</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/mie_tachibana/gifts">mie_tachibana</a>.</li>



    </ul><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Mie, Babe, babe, here's the happy happy I promised.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p><br/>
<b>Bleak and Tasteful</b><br/>
<br/>
<br/>
Satoshi's paintings were dark and without light. Often, greyscale or monotone, without colour or brightness. Bleak but tasteful. Jun would say, with a frown. Satoshi would agree with him.<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
His life was without color since he woke up from the healing coma they put him in. His world has become greyscale and monotone, without life. Bleak, but somehow tasteful.<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
Yet, mostly –Bland.<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
+<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
Satoshi wasn't entirely close to Sakurai until they reached Middle School. He enjoys memories he had of that time frame till high school, before he was 'collected'. He often finds himself using the Connector to broadcast his memories of those days to the holographic TV they bought, and when the other three were free, they'd sometimes watched it together and laugh at the adorable preteen Sakurai to ugly duckling Sakurai with his awkward fashion sense that made him so popular.<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
Nino likes to remind him that it isn't healthy, using the Connector that frequently. Ohno would like to remind him that his legs are gone and it can't cripple him anymore than he already is. His younger friend would glare at him until he'd stomp away looking for someone to help argue his point. (Satoshi is stubborn though, so he won't win even if Jun would give him this passive-aggressive angry glare and Aiba would give him this sad, very, very sad look.)  Satoshi would stop for awhile though, to placate them, shutting himself in Sakurai's old room for hours not coming out, having to be dragged to eat, drink or bathe, or in his art room where he looks the door, ignoring their pleas to come out and not to do anything stupid, and just stares at the large blank canvas at the very back of the room, where he promised he'd create a happy portrait.</p><p>A promise he made to the one who wasn't with them, a promise he made in darker but oddly happier times. But he couldn't make himself paint something happy despite the things he could see outside and around him. There were so many things he could paint, so many possibilities. But his hands felt like they were being<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
Satoshi always wonders why the times of trouble had more bright laughter than now where there was no need to fight to the death and peace was prominent. Satoshi wondered if he was a terrible person to want to go back to that period where they were side by side, laughing and being happy despite the carnage around them. Satoshi wondered if the Sakurai would hate him for wanting to have died instead, so he wouldn't have this hole inside him that can't be filled. Satoshi was always left wondering these days.<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
+<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
The end of war with monsters wasn't really an end. The rest of the world was still left fighting their own set of monsters that were ransacking their own lands. Satoshi often read it on the news and saw it on TV. But it was always an aftermath of the good news that was always on, like it didn't matter and that the rest of the world can suffer because Japan managed to rid themselves of the nests that plagued their area, and had helped their neighboring countries in getting rid of the nests closest to Japan. This made the eastern side of the world safer.<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
Good news such as the Philippines, Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam and Indonesia having banded together and successfully destroying the last of the nests between them and Hawaii declaring themselves liveable again was always good to hear. These news always made people elated and made them happy to help out people who no longer had their common enemies near their borders. Though North Korea and China had refused their assistance, Japan went ahead and destroyed any nests that the JDF seemed too close for comfort. This nearly caused an international incident before the two countries decided they couldn't afford to antagonise and start a war over it, not when they were still being plagued by the same monsters Japan has already managed to destroy.<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
Satoshi hated hearing those, because the bad news such as Italy having wept at the destruction of more than 80% of their historical monuments before managing to drive the monsters further south, having blocked Naples through to Barletta in a straight line, downwards to the islands disconnect from the mainland, leaving Southern Italy to burn and figure themselves a way to survive the rampaging monsters that remain scattered and nests that were becoming larger. Satoshi heard of Belgium's Capital being the centre of Monster activity and Germany slowly losing their fighters.<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
Satoshi lamented the lives lost and wondered what it would be like if the countries banded and shared their technology with each other. The Southeastern countries had bent their necks and asked Japan for their help. Japan was now allied strongly with these countries, but Satoshi knows that these countries now will bend their knees like knights to their king if they were called. (It wasn't fair, taking advantage of their desperation, but banding together was right, and they needed their own monsters killed).<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
But these bad news were barely mentioned, barely written about, barely spoken about. It was as if speaking aloud of them may bring Japan back to the darker times, it had become some sort of taboo. Out of sight, out of mind, was something her mother told him when he finally asked why she never came to visit him again after seeing him at the house he used to share Sakurai. She told her she expected him to die, and that he was stuck to the chair was something she couldn't handle. Satoshi never asked again, and still accepted her call every Sunday, but it was becoming shorter and shorter. But he still receives the care package she sends him every week. Why she kept buying him underwear, he never understood.<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
(Satoshi looked forward to receiving the care package on Sundays, every week. Feeling a little less alone in a world that seems to want to forget them.)<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
+<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
That wasn't actually quite true, they weren't forgotten. They couldn't be forgotten, not with how much the public loved them. They were all hailed as Heroes of the New Age. Their battles were all studied as History, their names memorized and practically worshipped. Little boys now wanted to be like them; a Muscle or Brain, playing mock battles together defeating other monsters that were thankfully imaginary, and Satoshi wanted to scream.<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
Nino took to ignoring them. Jun had them eating in his hands. Aiba was endeared to them, with his awkward yet appealing demeanour. Satoshi was near worshipped, one that was looked on from afar but with strange reverence. If he believed in superstition, this was how the birth of a god started, but he didn't believe any of those old stories. They had no place in the world of science and technology. (But Sakurai was the more superstitious among the two, always making a prayer at one of the still existing temples after every battle won. Satoshi found himself doing it in his place when he woke up, knowing he won't be able to.)<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
Sakurai's fame reached levels higher than his name when word of his "heroics" were made public. His last act to protect Tokyo garnered adoring fans. (The four of them knew though why Sakurai did what he did. But they didn't contest his hero-like status,)<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
The Sakurai clan made wave after wave to help the mecha pilots adjust into society. Something about how Sakurai would've wanted this for his fellows. (<i>Lies</i>, Nino would snort into his beer one night, <i>Sho-chan would do shit for all those bags, maybe one or two, but this extravagant shit wasn't in his morals<i>. Jun would snort and agree, <i>Sho would use his name to get us better opportunities, but he won't do the leg work for us</i>. Aiba would nod enthusiastically and almost fall over. Nino would try to stop him, but end up falling too. They'd all laugh and Satoshi would smile like he hasn't before. '<i>Sho wouldn't baby them</i>' he'd whisper when the laughter petered out into comfortable silence. '<i>No.</i>' Nino agreed. '<i>He'd baby <b>us </b>instead.</i>' They'd all start laughing and snorting beer out their noses again.)<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
+<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
Satoshi was outside hoping to get happy thoughts for the empty canvas at home. Nino was trying to get him to try the experimental new medical procedure that was supposedly attached to the spine and help people walk again. Supposedly. Satoshi didn't trust machines, he didn't even 'drive' the Mecha. Sakurai did all that.<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
"Captain," Nino's voice sounded breathless on the other end of the call, "We have to---Sorry!" Satoshi could hear the other bump into someone and he noticed the noise in the background. Nino was gasping and huffing. "Are you running?" Ohno asked, completely bewildered. After all, Nino and physical exercise didn’t correlate. At all. Nino gave another breathless sound, it took Ohno awhile to realise it was a laugh. Pulling the phone away from his face, he stared at it in complete shock. What was going on for Nino to be this elated?<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
"Oh-chan," Nino tried again, Ohno could hear the noise disappearing, as if entering a tunnel (--or  temple grounds for that matter). "Oh-chan, you should be seated." Nino told him, as he panted into the phone. "Wait, no never mind. Captain, captain, listen." Ohno jut his chin out in frustration, never patient with phone calls. "I'm listening. You're stalling." He shot back. Nino gave another happy breathless chuckle. "Yeah, but you'll love this." Nino told him and paused.<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
"Sho's awake."<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
Satoshi's world burst into <b>colour</b>.</i></i></p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Stay Safe Everyone!</p></blockquote></div></div>
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